It’s taken one-hundred years, but Eloise will finally have a place to go for a square meal.

When the Plaza Hotel’s Oak Room and Oak Bar reopen this summer, they’ll have something they never had: a real chef and owners free of the hotel.

The city’s biggest restaurant-world guessing game is over. The Oak Room’s chef will be Joël Antunes, 45, a rising star out of Atlanta where his Restaurant Joël has more awards than that city has peach trees.

The majority owner and managing partner is Joey Allaham, who runs Prime Grill, the popular kosher steakhouse on East 49th Street; his co-owners are Eli Gindi, founder of department store Century 21; and restaurateur Arthur Emil, Allaham’s longtime friend whose separate company, Night Sky, ran Windows on the World.

The Oak Room always had atmosphere to spare, but rarely a crowd. Especially in recent years, New Yorkers shunned its Bavarian castlelike splendor in droves.

Its movie appearances – it was where Cary Grant was kidnapped in “North by Northwest” – did not reverse its perception as a museum piece. Even hotel guests weren’t interested in a tourist joint without many tourists.

But Antunes is confident that soon all that will change.

“I’m a very lucky man,” Antunes says. He thinks he’s lucky – does he know what he’s in for in the unforgiving culinary crucible of Manhattan?

“It’s a big challenge to be in New York,” he acknowledges. “But this kind of opportunity happens maybe once or twice in your life. They approached me a few months ago, and I’m moving to New York with my wife.

“I know it’s very expensive. We can live in a small apartment not far from the restaurant. I’m going to be working 14 hours a day.”

He’ll need every minute just to reverse local diners’ aversion to the place. The old Plaza’s eateries were run out of its food-and-beverage department long after hipper inns brought in savvy outside restaurateurs.

But – unlike the Palm Court, which is part of the reopened, Fairmont-run Plaza – the Oak Room and Bar are independent of the hotel, and will have their own Central Park South entrance.

Allaham’s team is leasing the venues from Elad, the real estate company that spent more than $1 billion to buy and transform the Plaza into a mix of condos, a smaller hotel, restaurants and stores.

The Oak Room, with 90-100 seats, “will not be a steakhouse,” Antunes says. “I’m going to make American cuisine with a French touch. My goal is to cook for people in New York.”

French-born Antunes was named James Beard Foundation Best Chef for the Southeast in 2005. His Atlanta place was named one of the “Best New Restaurants” by Esquire and one of “America’s Best Restaurants” by Gourmet.

He’s a marathon runner who looks forward to being in New York because “it’s much easier to run here than in Atlanta.”

Allaham, all of 33, says he came to New York “as a Jewish immigrant out of Damascus” in 1993.

“I started from zero. I did the Prime Grill, which is the most recognized kosher restaurant anywhere, and also Solo in the Sony building.

“But the kosher market is limited. I’ll do what I do best, which is run a restaurant, at the Oak Room. I’m ready to start my journey with Joël.”

Allaham promises “chic décor, enticing food and fine dining.” The more casual Oak Bar will have no tablecloths.

The architect is Annabelle Selldorf, who designed the Abercrombie & Fitch store on Fifth Avenue. It’s unclear how much change she can bring to high-ceilinged spaces designed for the clientele of a century ago; the rooms can’t be altered without Landmarks Preservation Commission approval.

And the Oaks will be a union shop under tough Local 6 – although Allaham says, “They’ve been terrific with us. [Local president] Peter Ward wants this to work more than anything, he wants us to be profitable. They have met our every request.”

If it’s so easy, why didn’t the city’s biggest eatery-empire names jump in – people like Boulud or Danny Meyer?

Elad president Miki Naftali says, “There was extraordinary interest in the rooms. We decided to go with a young, talented and highly motivated team that would bring new energy and vitality to this landmark space.”

And why not a famed local chef, but Joël Antunes of Atlanta?

Allaham says, “I met a lot of great chefs in the US and in London. Joël is very humble, and that’s very important to me, as important as the food. Because it’s not going to be all about him, but about the Oak Room.”

Just how humble is clear when you ask Antunes if Elad offered him an apartment in the Plaza. “No,” he laughs -“I’m just a cook!”